Good News for Romney: Repeal Still Favored

Jeffrey H. Anderson

September 18, 2012 7:31 AM

As we get further removed from a Republican convention that, at least in prime time (and apart from Paul Ryan), didn’t emphasize the importance of repealing Obamacare, and a Democratic convention at which President Obama was praised for spearheading Obamacare’s passage regardless of the considerable difficulties he faced (namely, the opposition of the vast majority of the American people), Americans’ attitudes toward repeal now seem to have reverted back to what they’ve been across the better part of the past two-and-a-half years. This is good news for the Romney campaign.

The latest polling from Rasmussen Reports shows that, by a margin of 10 percentage points (53 to 43 percent), likely voters support the repeal of Obamacare. By a margin of 11 points (52 to 41 percent), independents support repeal.

By overwhelming margins, Americans think Obamacare would increase, rather than decrease, health costs (52 to 20 percent); reduce, rather than improve, the quality of care (46 to 22 percent); and raise, rather than lower, deficit spending (51 to 16 percent).

It’s hard to imagine any president being reelected when his signature legislation is this unpopular and is so widely predicted to cause such harm — and Rasmussen (like most pollsters) didn’t even ask Americans about Obamacare’s likely effect on their liberty.